jfw wrote:
It was by chance that I realised this by looking the requirements for renewal.
You have my sympathy. It’s hard to stay on top of all the changes. It’s particularly hard to know the unknown unknowns!
It would have been a simple thing for the NAAs to write to all holders of an EIR to advise them of the deadline.
Let me suggest that you contact your NAA and ask if they can extend the deadline for getting credit towards the BIR (Not the deadline for exercising the privileges but for obtaining the BIR). You an point out that you weren’t informed of the deadline and that nowhere in Belgium is offering it. Maybe you find a nice person who takes pity on you and agrees to an extended deadline.
If that doesn’t work, maybe a call to your local AOPA if there is one.
Definitely text laws evolve faster and many people fail to keep up, I come across someone who flies N-reg in UK without FCL papers, he is not aware of Dec21 cutoff, he is waiting for FAA/CAA to contact him if ‘his papers have to be revoked or edited’ 
On advising EIR holders or contacting NAA/AOPA, the number of people is very small, how many people have EIR in Belgium? it seems like a rare breed…I think there are about 10 people in France (few did it in Pontoise ATO as they are the only place who offers it), in UK, I doubt a single one was issued by CAA since its introduction according to on examiner
in UK, I doubt a single one was issued by CAA since its introduction according to on examiner
At least one was issured, maybe two!
Thanks for the info, would be interesting to know if the two pilots had an IMC/IRR that goes with the EIR?
They almost certainly did (if in the UK) and it was realised early on (lots of old threads on that here) that such a combination is not as “completely useless” as the EIR itself, because it enables one to depart and land in the UK in IFR conditions. However the EIR ban on SIDs/STARs still renders the EIR pretty well useless because most/all UK SIDs/STARs end up in Class A which the IMCR does not support.
The EIR is quite good for what used to be flown as “illegal VFR” and you need to be quite clever to do it safely.
The EIR was a good way of getting through cloud to get on top and get down through it again near destination.
Previously, VFR on top needed a hole to go up through and another to come back down.
EIR does not allow more than what PPL allows as far as “dealing with weather” is concerned, flying IMC during cruise is very rare either done on purpose, bad planing or flying aircraft with limited ceilings?
For filing FPL in the system, EIR allow one to legally file Eurocontrol and fly straight lines in en-route airspace
For arrivals & departures, if the pilot has VMC conditions at destination (1500m? for Golf VMC or CTR SVFR) he can always takeoff & land with change of flight rules
Before JAR/EASA, legally UK licensed PPL’s had to remain in sight of the ground unless they had an IMC rating.
The EIR allows a pilot to fly IMC it just doesn’t permit IMC approaches and departures.
Either in climb or descent you had to maintain VMC
Assuming aircraft is equipped and the pilot knows what he is doing…on VFR FPL, you can legally climb from VMC bellow clouds dead inside clouds to go above them and maintain VMC on top of clouds on PPL, the aim of that climb is to “maintain VMC” and “maintain MSA”, so it’s 1000% legal the bottle neck is airspace access, which is easy under IFR rules, that is the bonus you would get from the EIR ticket !
PS: the alternative is flying into terrain, that is illegal on PPL (you can’t do that with an IR neither)
it just doesn’t permit IMC approaches and departures.
Indeed, but crucially it also does not allow SIDs and STARs and that is what made the EIR dead in the water years before it actually came along – simply because ATC will tear their hair out when a pilot who “looks like IFR” cannot actually thus fly. The UK had a similar issue years ago with IMCR holders who could file a Eurocontrol flight plan but then had to refuse a climb into Class A; this was “solved” by chucking in the bin most flight plans which looked like that.
To be legal, the EIR pilot would always be filing Z or Y. Actually Z is normally used if both ends are VFR. But that deprives him of much of the “regularity” of the IFR world. It chucks him into the uncertain world of VFR, VRPs, and all the related crap, much discussed previously – example. So he gets hassle at the start, nice easy flight in the middle, and hassle at the end. How much hassle? Well, it depends on where, how clever he is at gaming the system, and which side of the bed the ATCO fell out in the morning. Some are nice, while others (La Rochelle is my lasting memory here ) will scream at you to “bring a map next time you visit our city”
So, like so much in the world of private IFR, all the calls for a more accessible IR have failed to deliver one – because politics ensured that the factors which make the US IR so much more accessible can never work in the European airspace-political system.
Anyway, we’ve done it all before, and it is off topic for EIR-IR conversion.
